Fact of the day

At the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, Fritz Thiedemann - who had commanded a German cavalry unit during World War Two before being captured towards the end and interned in a Russian prison camp - created a unique piece of history. The farmer's son earned bronze medals in both individual show jumping and team dressage to become the only rider in Olympic history to win medals in two equestrian disciplines at the same Games. He went on to gold medals in team jumping at the 1956 Olympics, when the equestrian events were held in Stockholm, and Rome 1960. The Thiedemann rein is named after him.

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Paralympics takes centre stage in Google film

December 16 - Four different scenes from the London 2012 Paralympic Games have appeared in Google's yearly highlights film - Google Zeitgeist.

The 2012 film is an in-depth look at the "spirit of the times" as seen through the billions of searches on Google over the past year.

Google's film opens with a search for "here's to the curious" in which Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner is followed by shots of South African double-amputee sprinter, Oscar Pistorius, who raced at both the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Later in the film, a Google search "for something special" reveals the London 2012 Paralympic Closing Ceremony and the Agitos, the Paralympic symbol, hung from Tower Bridge in London.

Brazilian swimmer Daniel Dias is shown diving into the pool and Pistorius is seen running the curve in the 200 metres T44 final in which Brazil's Alan Fonteles pushed ahead to take a shock gold.

Wheelchair rugby was the second most-searched-for Paralympic sport of 2012

The Google Zeitgeist website also includes over 800 lists of top search terms from 55 countries.

In the United Kingdom, "Murderball" - wheelchair rugby - and wheelchair basketball were the second and third most-searched-for sports.

In Ireland, visually impaired sprinter Jason Smyth was the fifth most searched for athlete and in South Africa, the Paralympics was the third most-searched-for event.

It comes after the Paralympic Games were revealed as a huge online success this year.

Twitter unveiled earlier in the week that #Paralympics was the top trending sports topic in the United Kingdom in 2012, beating off Manchester United Football Club (#MUFC) and the #Olympics.

During the London 2012 Paralympic Games, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) also registered record-breaking figures for its website and social media channels as nearly two million people visited paralympic.org.

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